Trump statue removed quickly, but legacy lingers

Photographers take pictures of a passerby as she hugs a statue depicting a nude Donald Trump on Aug. 18.

Photo: Justin Sullivan, Getty Images

For a minute there, it looked like the naked Donald Trump statue was going to come and go in San Francisco, as it has in other cities.

A few laughs, lots of selfies, and everybody makes the joke about the missing genitalia. And we’re done.

But, just as the buzz was fading, some honest-to-God San Francisco broke out.

First, Lefty O’Doul’s offered to display the horrible-looking thing, which makes sense for a sports pub. A little publicity, something for the tourists to see, and it’s San Francisco quirky.

Then the Police Department got involved, announcing that whoever showed up to retrieve the statue would be charged with vandalism. So, having successfully taken a statue into custody, now the SFPD is going all hard time on what was supposed to be a one-day joke.

And that was followed by a protester, local artist and transsexual man, Shane Brodie, who complained that the statue — which included the title “The Emperor Has No balls” — was not only fat-shaming but ridiculing trans bodies and shouldn’t be put on display.

My theory of what’s offensive is if someone feels offended, it should be considered.

Brodie has appeared in the Castro, nude, holding a sign that said, “I love my fat body.” He tweeted: “I’m protesting with my lovely fat queer trans body and at the Trump statue site in the Castro.”

The protest was an unexpected turn of events, even for someone like local writer and body image expert Virgie Tovar, who went over to look at the statue when it was originally staged. She said that a friend who is new to the city “wanted to have a San Francisco cultural moment.”

Tovar said she originally did not find the statue “offensive or upsetting” and posted a photo of it on social media. And that’s when the backlash hit.

“I was overwhelmed by the intensity of reaction,” Tovar told me Monday. “I think I had missed the nuance that it was trans-phobic. On one hand it seems Trump is being parodied, but it is actually at the expense of people already experiencing intense marginalization.”

OK, so with that logic, the Trump statue should be put in a dark room and never be seen again.

Except ...

Is the statue a work of art? Tovar said she thinks it is.

“Art,” she said, “creates important cultural conversations. And we’re having one right now.”

But just because something is upsetting doesn’t mean it shouldn’t be displayed. This is the city, remember, that commissioned a bust by edgy artist Robert Arneson of assassinated Mayor George Moscone. When it was unveiled in 1981, the pedestal had bullet holes, drops of blood, a depiction of a handgun and the words “bang, bang, bang, bang.”

It was in such poor taste that Arneson received death threats. Rather than display it, the city rejected the piece and it was sold to a private collector.

But by 2012, it was back. Purchased by San Francisco’s Museum of Modern Art, it was displayed as recently as 2013. Speaking to a Chronicle reporter in 2012, Christopher Moscone, George’s son, said the original unveiling was “a slap in the face.”

“But with the passage of time,” he said, “I think this is probably a good place for it now. Artists want to provoke passion and feeling, and he definitely achieved that.”

Frankly, I doubt the Trump statue is going to reach such artistic heights. But the “art versus parody” discussion is worth having.

And then there are politics, both local and national.

The normally hypersensitive Trump has been entirely silent on the statue. Not a peep or a tweet. It is a reminder that one thing a bully cannot stand up to is being laughed at.

And of course locally, Supervisor Scott Wiener is running for state Senate, and his attempts to advocate for displaying the paunchy statue gets him some publicity. When the protests began, however, he had to affirm his support for the transgender community and speak out against making fun of “the way Trump’s body is depicted.”

“The Trump statue is political art,” he texted. “I interpret the statue — as do many people — as exposing (literally and figuratively) Donald Trump as the fraud he is.”

Now the word is a compromise is in the works, although there may have to be a ruling by the city attorney, believe it or not. Any fines for vandalism would be paid, and the statue would be sprung from jail. The artist is expected to fly out for an unveiling this week. But there’s bound to be more to come.

C.W. Nevius has been a columnist at the San Francisco Chronicle for more than 20 years, covering sports, reviewing movies and spotting trends. He is currently a metro columnist, appearing on Tuesdays, Thursdays and Saturdays.

As a sports columnist, he climbed the ski jump at the Norway Olympics, ate bee larvae in Japan and skied in the French Alps. In all, he covered eight Olympic Games, from Australia to Spain to Korea. (And the strangest place of all, Los Angeles.)

He also wrote about riding the “Straight Talk Express” with John McCain during his first presidential bid, parachuting out of an airplane and running the Boston Marathon.

Although he reviewed movies only for a year, he did rate a blurb with his byline on the DVD box of “The Santa Clause 2,” to the undying embarrassment of his kids.

He co-wrote “Splash Hit,” about building the Giants’ waterfront stadium, with Joan Walsh. His latest book is “Crouching Father, Hidden Toddler: A Zen Guide for New Dads.”